


What Happened in Spokane

by vimesbootstheory



Category: Z Nation (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-26
Updated: 2018-09-26
Packaged: 2019-07-18 00:36:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16107056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vimesbootstheory/pseuds/vimesbootstheory
Summary: Doc promised to punch Murphy's teeth in, and then he didn't. Then three years later, Sarge decides she wants to play a game. For some reason, it gets under 10K's skin. (A couple of conversations that I need to have happened at some point, because otherwise what was the point of season 3?)





	What Happened in Spokane

The knife came out during a rare moment of peace.

The group had pulled off the highway when a torrent of rain conquered the best efforts of their jeep's windshield wipers. Happily, they'd stumbled upon a sturdy, defensible farmhouse and, after Sgt. Lilley and 10K had granted two mercies each to the undead occupants, they'd settled in to ride out the storm.

'Settling in' meant something different for each member of the group. Warren had immediately located the master bedroom and fallen asleep with her boots on. Murphy had wandered off to un-plundered corners of the property with no explanation. 10K had pilfered the pantry and emerged with a can each of baked beans and white tuna. Doc had embarked on a search for a bathtub and a hot tap. Sarge had investigated a modest personal library of pulpy paperbacks, and brought a stack of them back to the kitchen table. She sat down opposite 10K, who was happily munching on a noxious paste of future halitosis, and started to idly flip through the pages.

It amused her for all of five minutes. She added the final book to the new pile of discarded volumes and leaned back in her chair, bleary-eyed and irritated.

"No joy?"

It was Doc, back from the upstairs washroom, looking no cleaner than before.

"Nah," said Sarge, wrinkling her nose. She nodded to a stain on the floor, the last remaining evidence of the previous homeowners. "These guys had shit taste in books. Who bothers with this much Dan Brown?"

10K's eyebrows knitted together. "That guy who was into all those bible conspiracies? I think I remember liking his stuff."

Sarge laughed, but not unkindly, and patted him on the cheek.

"Of course you did." She gave Doc a once-over, pausing to note the ring of caked-on filth around his shirt collar and the spatters of mud on all four limbs. "No luck with the bubble bath, huh?"

"No luck," Doc agreed with a sigh, and he slumped into a third chair.

Boredom, that dreaded post-apocalyptic luxury, fell on the group. Then Sarge grinned wickedly, rummaged around in her rucksack for a moment or three, and out came the knife.

"Let's play a game."

Across from her, 10K stopped chewing.

"A game?" said Doc. "I'm down, but I haven't seen a dart board around, if that's what you're thinking."

"Not darts. You know the knife game?"

For a moment, Doc thought he felt 10K stiffen beside him. Just then, 10K's hand seemed to fly up to a spot just in front of his face. Doc frowned.

"You OK, kid?"

10K's sudden movement morphed into a half-hearted scratch at his ear.

"Uh, yeah. Thought I saw a bug," he mumbled.

Sarge ignored the exchange, splaying her left hand out on the table. She balanced the knife, point-down, in the wood of the table, half an inch from the right margin of her thumb.

"Dumb question. Everybody knows the knife game." The careful pattern began: between thumb and forefinger, between forefinger and middle, between middle and ring, et cetera, slow and careful. "I used to be really good at this. My -- ahm, lieutenant Mueller gave me some tips once, before Black Summer. If you're nice to me, I might consider sharing."

The knife pattern sped up slightly, deftly hopping over ring finger, pinky, ring again. Sgt. Lilley looked up briefly from her game and grinned at 10K, who took no notice. He watched the knife's progress intently, frowning. He looked confused, Doc thought, and a little lost. After a moment, 10K opened his mouth to speak, shut it again, opened once more.

"You shouldn't do that," he said, and his voice sounded oddly strangled. "It's stupid, and dangerous. Let's do something else."

The knife kept moving.

"Excuse the heck outta me, I guess." There was laughter in Sarge's voice. "You got a better idea? I'm having fun over here. Well," she conceded. "' _Fun_ ' is a stretch. As much fun as we're gonna find cooped up in a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere."

"What did you have in mind, 10K?" asked Doc.

But just then the knife sped up, and 10K didn't answer, attention glued to its tabletop dance.

"10K?"

Nothing.

Sarge looked up again, curious. This time, 10K noticed.

" _Sarge_ ," he snapped. "Can you -- _jeez_ , can you at least watch what you're doing?"

Sgt. Lilley's mouth twisted into a smile and, just to watch her friend squirm, she squeezed her eyes shut and made the knife hop quickly over her fingers, pinky to thumb, thumb to pinky. 10K cringed visibly.

Doc couldn't figure why a game, of all things, would have an unflappable sharpshooter like 10K so worked up. Alright, so it wasn't an entirely _harmless_ activity, but it was a far cry from the everyday danger of mowing down a parade of zombies with a slingshot and a crowbar. It definitely didn't warrant the deep, shaky breath that then escaped 10K's lips.

Mercifully, finally, the knife stopped. Sarge picked it up and offered it, handle-first, to Doc.

"Want to have a go, old man?"

It happened so quickly that Doc blinked and missed it. One moment Sarge was smiling and offering the knife to Doc; the next, she was startled and empty-handed, and the knife was in 10K's hand. He had stood up so suddenly and violently that the near-empty bowl of tuna and beans had been overturned. He gripped the blade in his fist, knuckles white, fist tight enough to push the edge through skin.

" _We're not doing this_ ," said 10K, his voice tight. "It's stupid, and dangerous. We have to go out there tomorrow, use our hands to fight, and you want to cut 'em all up? You looking to give the Zs a fighting chance, or what?"

It was probably more words strung together than Sarge had ever heard out of 10K, and by the look on her face, she knew it.

"What's the matter with you, huh? I'm not cutting up my hands -- look, they're fine! It's a _game_ , I'm just relaxing with what little rest time we have," she said. She didn't look at all hurt or offended, just confused.

Just then, all the pent-up steam driving 10K to mania seemed to escape, leaving him deflated and lost. For a long moment, he just stood there, knife clutched close to his chest, staring at an indistinct point in his eye-line as if he were trying to remember something. Doc and Sarge exchanged a worried glance.

"Hey, kid," Doc said, as if to a spooked horse. He reached slowly for the hand that held the knife. "Let me take a look at that hand, OK? You're holding that thing harder than you should, just relax your grip for a sec."

Mechanically, 10K did as he was told. The knife passed to his other hand, now held in a loose fist. Doc took his hand between both of his own and peered into the palm warily. There was a dark pink line across the palm, with a series of shallow scratches along its length, from which a lazy puckering of blood swelled. Doc swiped the cloth place mat from the tabletop and dabbed at the scratches. No cause for concern, at least physically. He kneaded at the angry pink line with one thumb, more out of helplessness than anything, and 10K's hand curled around his own, accepting the comfort. The change in posture allowed Doc full view of the back of 10K's fingers, and a puzzle piece slotted into place. 10K's fingers were decorated with a dozen angry white scars, cut parallel to the knuckle. They were old and long past healed, barely remarkable.

A puzzle piece, yes, but a piece so apparently innocuous as to be completely unhelpful.

"Played a couple rounds of the knife game before, huh?" said Doc, making a stab at casual. He nodded at the scars. 10K followed his gaze and considered his fingers, looking so puzzled that Doc could swear he'd never noticed them before.

"Uh... yeah." 10K swallowed visibly. He smiled, and it was all the more inexplicably heartbreaking for being one-hundred-percent fake. "Yeah. Apparently I'm not very good at it, ha."

"I should say so, kid, _damn!_ Look at that mess. You know, there's no shame in ducking out when you haven't got the knack for something. You shoulda just stopped!"

For some reason, it was the wrong thing to say. 10K's face appeared to shut down, his jaw to slacken.

"Yeah. You're right. I should've stopped." He nodded vaguely as he spoke, and after a moment, he handed the knife over to Doc. "Here. You don't have to listen to me, I guess, but please don't -- no, it's fine. I'm going to go have a nap."

He picked up the overturned bowl and headed off, head down, towards the staircase leading to the second floor.

\--

Doc decided to hang on to the knife, and Sarge didn't push the issue. Instead, she picked 'Digital Fortress' up off the top of her pile of rejected books and slunk away to the living room.

"What the hell was that about?" Doc asked, addressing an empty kitchen. No answer was forthcoming.

Instead, a noise came from a door leading off from the kitchen, high-pitched glass on glass. Curious, Doc followed the sound, through the door and down a musty set of stairs to a poorly-lit cellar. The light and noise were coming from a far corner of the cellar, but Doc was suddenly in no great hurry to identify its source, because the cellar was stocked from floor to ceiling with wine.

Contrary to the expectations of most who knew him, Doc was not much of an alcohol guy, and even less of a wine guy. He had no idea whether it made any kind of biochemical sense, but for whatever reason, his admirable constitution with respect to most illicit substances was absolutely useless in the face of a couple of vodka coolers. Still, he wouldn't kick a good bottle of wine out of bed for eating crackers. Doc's fingers danced over the labels until he landed on a likely-looking Merlot. He pulled it from the shelf, uncorked it, and took a deep swig in one fluid motion.

Another rattle of glass on glass came from the far corner of the cellar, followed by a low chuckle and an indistinct mutter. Not a zombie, then.

"Could be a half-zombie, though," said Doc to himself, and tittered at his own non-joke. He was pretty sure it was a biological impossibility for the wine to have hit him already. Nevertheless: laughing at things that aren't funny, checkity-check. Anyway, Doc didn't have to worry about fighting off a zombie while tipsy -- while was _infinitely_ harder than the same task while high, per Stephen "Doc" Beck -- and that was the important thing. He sat down on the floor with his wine bottle, mind drifting back to the odd happenstances upstairs.

The knife came out again.

10K used knives all the time. Doc had witnessed him carry out many deft executions, driving a knife-point through the forehead of a zombie who had strayed too close for the slingshot or rifle to be of any use. So it couldn't just be about knives. But it couldn't really be about them using weapons for a game, either -- what about that sniping competition so many years ago? 10K had been as happy as Doc had ever seen him when he won, and just as happy to give up the prize.

So then... _what was it?_

Doc had to admit it, he just wasn't equipped to answer the question, because he didn't know 10K well enough. What did he know? He knew the kid had given his father mercy, that he'd promised to do so and done his duty when the time came. He knew 10K had spent a lot of time in the outdoors as a child and teenager, which had come in handy so many times along the road. And... that's it. Doc was tempted to blame the wine for making his head fuzzy and memories difficult to grasp, but in truth, that was all he knew. He didn't even know the kid's given name. Warren had once hinted obliquely that she knew what it was, and Doc had been so brutally tempted to ask. He hadn't. Come to think of it, that was odd -- why did Warren know 10K's birth name, when he, Doc, did not?

As he nursed the bottle of wine and ruminated further, his thumb slid absent-mindedly over the edge of the knife blade. The knife game, then.

Mimicking Sgt. Lilley's earlier actions, he splayed his left hand out on the floor, fingers spread wide. He balanced the knife point-down next to his thumb, and recreated the knife pattern: between thumb and forefinger, between forefinger and middle, between middle and ring, et cetera, slow and careful. Much slower than Sarge, and thrice as careful, very aware of the effects of inebriation on knife accuracy. He was shyly hoping from a eureka moment, but of course none came. Just a stupid, reckless game for stupid, reckless kids.

A shadow fell across Doc's work space, and the shock made him poke himself in the ring finger with the knife's point. Too slow and careful to be dangerous, it didn't even redden the skin. He looked up to see Murphy, standing over him with three wine bottles tucked under one arm. He was staring down at Doc's hand with a granite expression.

"Hey, Murphy."

Murphy nodded.

"Doc." His voice was slurred with drink. He kept looking at Doc's hand. _This again?_ Experimentally, Doc started to move the knife again, just as slow and careful as before. After a couple seconds, Murphy snapped out of his reverie.

"Hey, Doc, uh. This is going to sound weird," he said. "But maybe, well. Maybe don't play that game in front of 10K, hey? Just a tip."

He seemed to think that was enough said, and turned to leave. Doc scrambled to his feet.

"Hang on, _what?_ What do you mean? Murphy, _what do you know about this?"_

If Murphy hadn't looked awkward before, he definitely did now. It was an ill-fitting look on him, fundamentally Wrong on a face more suited to arrogance.

"What do I know about _what?"_

Doc huffed with impatience. "Why shouldn't 10K see someone playing that game?"

Murphy took a step backwards, avoiding Doc's eye.

"Look, I honestly don't even know if it would faze him. Probably not, he's a tough kid. I don't even know if he remembers. Just in case, though. Look, you're going to have to take my word for it. He might not be a huge fan. And none of us want that shit stirred up again."

"'If he remembers'? Remembers _what?"_ Doc found that he was shouting, and suddenly remembered that at least two people were sleeping two floors up. He forced himself to lower his voice. "What shit is there to stir up? Why don't _I_ know about this -- whatever this is?"

Doc wanted to take back the last question as soon as he said it. It sounded selfish to his ears -- but dammit, that's how he felt. Why the hell would Murphy, of all people, know some deep, dark secret about 10K while Doc was out of the loop? Doc might not like to look too hard at the fact, but there was no love lost between 10K and Murphy, everyone knew that. Warren had once asked Doc whether he thought it was worth setting up a contingency plan in case 10K decided that Murphy had outlived his usefulness (Doc had said no, but without any real conviction). Not the kind of dynamic for exchanging secrets, in short. And yet.

Petulant, Doc wondered wildly if Murphy knew 10K's birth name, too. That would just figure, wouldn't it?

Murphy, meanwhile, had summoned a countenance of righteousness.

_"You_ don't know because _you_ haven't always been around," he said. "And that's all I'm saying about it. We have a mission, or something... maybe two missions? In two different directions? Anyway, we can't be distracted by rehashing what happened in Spokane, trust me."

_'Trust me.'_

Doc didn't. He pushed himself up into a squat and onto his feet, moved towards the door, paused. It'd sound dumb if he was right, but it'd nag him if he didn't ask.

"Say, you don't know 10K's name, do you?"

Murphy blinked.

"I do, yeah. It's --"

"Don't _tell_ me!" Doc interrupted. He shot Murphy an alarmed look and, without another word, bounded up the basement stairs.

_What the_ hell?

\--

The rest of the house slept, but Doc did not.

Murphy's oblique comments had narrowed the field. Whatever it was that had bothered 10K, Murphy had either been there to witness it, or had been in a position to hear about it afterwards. More importantly, it had happened in Spokane.

Loathe though he was to admit it, Doc knew very little about what had happened in Spokane. He had seen the group off in a Spokane-bound direction, off to get Murphy to stop being an arrogant idiot and get back on track with whatever 'mission' remained to be pursued. He had heard the gist of the set-up there: Murphy had been drunk on power and controlling a community of blends, while simultaneously planning efforts to retrieve his daughter from her temporary guardians in Springfield. And 10K had been there, too. Nobody really talked about the respective sides of the conflict in Spokane, perhaps because everyone had decided that getting along in the present was more important than posterity. Doc had gleaned the impression, however, that 10K had not been on Warren's side. Nobody had said so in so many words, but it was legible in the slight tension and a chronic, mild apology in their interactions when they'd first reunited after Zona.

Of course, there was the bite. That was likely a factor. Doc remembered catching a glimpse of the mark for the first time, remembered how scared 10K had been at the thought of being seen differently by the others, of being seen as the same beast that had taken over the sweet and level-headed Cassandra. He'd hugged his almost-son and sworn to punch Murphy's teeth in.

He hadn't punched Murphy's teeth in. There hadn't been time, and then later... well, it had been two years, and 10K was fine, and it had seemed petty to stir shit up.

Doc stood at the foot of the stairs, looking up at a gallery of closed bedroom doors. One, in particular.

There was a choice here, he could feel. Good ole Doc could keep pleasing everyone all the time, a happy mediator; or, he could really _be there_ , properly, for the one person on this rotten Earth who needed him most.

Some shit needed stirring.

\--

Doc tried to open the bedroom door as quietly as he could, but it screamed obnoxiously anyway. Nobody around to oil the hinges.

Not that it made a difference: 10K was wide awake, lying face-up on the bed. Caught in the middle of counting the ceiling tiles, he turned his head to Doc and gave him a tired smile.

"Hey."

"Hay is for horses," said Doc, stupidly. Something to say, he supposed.

A pause -- bloated on one end, nonplussed on the other.

"Is the rain letting up, or...?" 10K prompted.

"No-o. Don't think so?" Doc felt useless; he wished those old counselling instincts would kick in from the pre-apocalypse days, but maybe it didn't work like that. Maybe when it was your own life, you just had to _try_ like anybody else. "I made hot cocoa. Do you want some? It might be a little stale."

10K frowned. Then: "Sure."

He bounded off the bed and the pair returned to the kitchen table downstairs. Doc had covered the knife marks with a place mat. They nursed twin mugs of cocoa for a comfortable, silent minute, while Doc planned his approach.

"I found where Murphy scuttled off to," he said finally. 10K hummed disinterestedly into his cocoa, which was response enough. "There's a wine cellar downstairs."

"Yeah?"

He sounded vaguely intrigued. It occurred to Doc that they'd never celebrated 10K's 21st birthday. Doc didn't know when it was. No liquor laws in the apocalypse, anyway.

"Yeah. He's got a lot to sleep off. Mighta caught me with Sarge's knife, trying out that game. I know you asked me not to," Doc said quickly. "Or you didn't, I guess. Just wanted to see how bad my hand-eye coordination is. As it turns out? Not too shabby."

It was a good thing that Doc was used to 10K's preference for silence as a conversation option.

"He saw me playing that knife game. And do you know what he said?" Doc asked. 10K shrugged, not meeting his friend's eyes. "He said not to do that around you. Seemed to think you wouldn't like it."

Finally, 10K looked up. His eyes were wide.

"He did?"

Doc nodded.

"... Did he say why?"

"No," said Doc. "He was pretty cagey about that. Something to do with Spokane, he said."

He didn't want 10K to think he was being interrogated, though in a way he supposed that's exactly what was happening. A prospectively altruistic interrogation. 10K let out a long, shaky breath.

"That..." The kid cast around for a strong enough epithet. "That _asshole."_

It wasn't strong enough. Doc didn't say anything, hoping to get him on a roll, get some momentum.

"You know what's weird?" 10K said. It wasn't a real question. "I kinda hoped he'd just forgot. Sure, he's been acting like the blue messiah all along, but lately it's been easier to pretend he's a different guy entirely. Seems like everybody else just forgot, like none of that even happened."

He was hurt by that fact, Doc could tell. And it was true, they didn't talk about Spokane. That's why Doc knew fuck-all about what went down. The pause stretched out just a bit too long, so Doc stepped in to grease the track.

"Before we all met up, the last I saw you, you were coming down from the concoction I gave you at the mental hospital. We split up... you asked me not to tell the others about --"

"About the bite, yeah," said 10K, and his hand flew to the back of his neck to rub at the scarred skin there. "I didn't want them to think that I'd turned into something like... like Cassandra."

This would be a hard question, but Doc felt it was important.

"Would they have been right?"

10K's face split with an outraged hurt.

" _No!_ What are you talking about, of course not! You saw me, we talked afterwards. You think that -- you thought that I was..."

"Hey, hey. None of us are experts on this bite nonsense," said Doc, raising a placating hand. "For all I know, it gets worse, with time or maybe with how close you get to Murphy? I don't know how it works. You say it wasn't like that, I believe you. How was it, then?"

10K relented, took a steadying breath.

"It was two ways, really," he began. "One with the drug, one without. When I went back to Spokane, with Murphy around... it was so creepy, Doc, I could refuse flat-out to do some stupid job or chore but my body would do it anyway."

'Creepy' was such an understatement, it was almost funny. Doc had heard about how Murphy had forced La Reina into turning against Alvarez, but it was another thing entirely to contemplate full-time motor control on a damn _whim_. He didn't ask why or how 10K ended up back in Spokane. He figured that if it was important, the kid would come back to it.

"Most of the blends acted pretty normal, but I guess I was different. There was this drug Dr. Merch cooked up, don't ask me what that was all about, but it did the trick to work against the bite. I told Chaffin it was my _free will_." Here, he smiled self-consciously. Maybe he thought it sounded melodramatic in retrospect. Doc thought it just sounded accurate. "When I'd had a booster, I was a pain in the ass."

He frowned, remembering.

"'Pain in the ass'?" Doc repeated, trying out a small smile.

"Murphy said that, I think."

"Well, good, sounds like he needed one."

"You're telling me," said 10K ruefully. "The point is, I tried to drag my feet about it all, as much as I could. But when I hadn't had any in a while..."

His focus wavered, gaze clouding over slightly. It was the same look he'd had right after his outburst and confiscation of Sarge's knife.

"If you hadn't had any in a while, what would happen?" Doc prompted. It did the trick. 10K shook himself slightly, and ploughed on.

"I just sort of... stopped, I guess? It's harder to remember those parts. I don't think I did much thinking. Not like Cassandra, though. I didn't hurt anybody, I don't think. I can't remember hurting anybody. So it wasn't like Cassandra."

As if he were afraid, still, of being condemned for anything he'd done while under Murphy's control. As it would matter to Doc if he'd hurt someone completely against his own will. A steadily growing hurt settled in Doc's chest. He hated to think about 10K losing himself like that, hated it so much that his hands started to pat around for something to squeeze or hit. He settled for another sip of cocoa. Not very cathartic, but definitely delicious.

"A little while after Murphy let me out of the basement --"

Doc coughed on his mouthful of cocoa.

"The... basement?"

"Oh, yeah," said 10K. "When I got back to the Museum of Progress, I was by myself in a kind of cell in the basement for a while." He frowned. "Come to think of it, it's a little weird that a museum has a cell in the basement, isn't it?"

Doc sputtered. "Murphy put you in _solitary confinement_ in the _basement_ of a _museum?!"_

10K looked surprised at his outrage.

"Well, yeah. I stole the vaccines. Did I tell you I jumped out a second floor window when I escaped with those? Hurt at the time, but it makes a good story, when anybody's listening."

"Yeah, great story," Doc muttered. This was a bigger can of worms than he knew how to deal with. "So... he let you out?"

10K nodded. He pulled his knees up in front of him, crammed between his chin and the table's edge.

"There's a stretch there that I don't remember much about. I do remember one day, though. Murphy couldn't figure out why I was reacting differently to being a blend, so he wanted to test me. Gave me a knife... no, actually, I think it was a letter opener."

Doc's breath caught. Finally, here was where the knife came in. Another silence yawned between them, but Doc could fill in at least a couple of details.

"He made you play the knife game," he whispered. 10K shrugged. Doc punched his friend's arm, a playful but half-hearted gesture, given the context. "I bet you're pretty good at it."

"Damn straight," said 10K, and Doc was pleased to spot the ghost of a smile. "It's harder, though, when you're not all human anymore, and you're going too fast to pay attention."

Doc felt sick. He didn't need further elaboration to guess what happened next. He could see the evidence in the white, raised lines on 10K's fingers. 10K caught the glance at the scars and shrugged again.

"It wasn't fun, but they healed OK. Murphy bandaged 'em up, if you can believe it."

Suddenly so mad he could spit, Doc jumped to his feet.

_"So what?"_ he yelped. 10K didn't deserve any words of anger, even indirectly, but Doc couldn't help it. "Is that supposed to _excuse_ it?"

10K smiled.

"Of course not," he said.

"Then why -- how are you not... _damn it,_ kid, how have you not piked him in his sleep already? You _must_ hate him."

"I _do_ hate him," said 10K. He looked tired, all of a sudden. Of course he _would_ be tired, Doc remembered. He'd just been lying awake when Doc had found him upstairs. "I've always hated him, at least since Cassandra's bite. I hated him before he bit me, and I hated him after, and I hate him now. I must be better than I thought at hiding it, if you really couldn't tell."

There was just a slight hint of accusation there. Doc thought back to all the snippy comments made at Murphy's expense. Sure, there'd been a couple, but nothing more damning than a diss between playground rivals. Nothing to suggest the depths of the wrongs 10K had suffered under Murphy's control. And Doc suspected he was getting only a bare hint at what had gone on in Spokane.

Doc sat back down at the table, feeling as exhausted as 10K looked.

"I don't know how to look Murphy in the face tomorrow," Doc admitted. "I don't know how to keep this group together, or even how it's stayed together this long. I guess that's why you keep it under wraps, huh? To keep us together?"

10K nodded.

"I'd follow Warren anywhere," he said. "And Warren is not going to let Murphy go no matter what happens... hell if I know _why,_ at this point."

He made a harsh sound at the back of his throat.

"Hey Doc, did you find any water earlier?"

Doc chuckled and rose from the table. "You don't usually talk this much, do you? I'll grab some for you. The well water's gone nuclear, but I saw some jugs under the stairs in the basement."

When Doc returned with a glass of water, 10K was still sitting at the table, staring into space. His eyelids were starting to droop. Doc sat down and pushed the glass across to him. As he watched 10K down the glass, a petty, selfish question occurred to him.

"How come Murphy knows your name?"

Doc cursed himself. He hadn't intended for it to slip out, but the curiosity gnawed at him. 10K appeared to deliberate for a moment. Then he reached over to where his bag sat, leaning against the wall with his sniper rifle, and pulled out something silver on a chain.

"I don't know," he said. "Cassandra knew it, before she was bitten. I guess she could've told him. Don't really like to think about that. It could've just as easily been me. If he asked, when I was really out of it, I probably would've just said. I don't remember... but there's a lot I don't remember."

10K put the silver thing on the table. It was a set of dog tags, and they both read the same word: 'Thomas'. Doc's whole brain shied away from the knowledge, as if he knew intrinsically that it was something he wasn't meant to know.

"I've never gone by 'Thomas', but Murphy up and decided I should go by that instead of '10K'. Dunno how he put together dog tags in post-apocalyptic Spokane."

Doc felt thoroughly ashamed for bringing it up. Had 10K felt backed into a corner? He didn't need to know this.

"You didn't need to tell me," said Doc. "I _know_ what your name is. It's Ten Thousand."

10K grinned.

"Thanks, I know," he said simply. "But it feels weird for Murphy to know and not you."

"If you say so, kid." Doc picked up the dog tags. "'Thomas', huh?"

"My Pa called me Tommy."

\--

The artists formerly known as Operation Bitemark woke the next morning to clear skies and a horizon clear of zombies. Warren and Sarge came down to the ground floor clear-eyed and well-rested; Doc and 10K woke up with cricks in their respective necks from falling asleep at the kitchen table. The morning preparations were disrupted when Murphy finally woke up, rousing the very foundations of the house with his hungover groans.

He stepped into the kitchen and was greeted with a bony punch to the teeth. Once, twice, thrice in the mouth. Two teeth broke off, one lodging itself in Doc's knuckle. Doc didn't care, even when Warren started hollering angrily for an explanation, and Sarge ran for a towel to stem the bleeding from Murphy's mouth. It was worth it twice over for 10K's small smile across the kitchen.

It had taken three years to get around to it, but he'd finally punched Alvin Murphy's teeth in.

**Author's Note:**

> So this was weird, 'cause I haven't written fanfiction in about ten years. But I'm coming to terms with the unfortunate fact that this show wants us to forget a lot about season 3, and this is part of my process. There are quite possibly contradictions with canon in this, since I wrote it in one sitting and didn't feel like fact-checking. I wouldn't be opposed to hearing about any you spot, but don't lay it on too thick.  
> Oh, also, hopefully this doesn't read like Murphy bashing. I love Murphy as a character, and the show wouldn't be what it is without him. I just don't think it makes sense for 10K (and Doc, by extension) to even tolerate his presence.


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